The City of McKinney’s Gabe Nesbitt Park is an expansive and multifaceted public park that contains a variety of recreational resources. Within its grounds are baseball and softball fields, jogging tracks, play structures, a skate park, an aquatics center, a public library and a 23-court tennis and pickleball center named The Courts of McKinney.
SpawGlass-North Texas teamed up with Parkhill to construct a highly anticipated indoor addition to the tennis center that will allow for all-weather events, tournaments, instruction and recreational use. The 56,000-square-foot facility was created to meet the City’s growing demand, giving residents and visitors expanded resources in a first-class athletic complex. In addition to large-scale sporting events, the expansion of the tennis center allows the City to provide the community with additional resources such as youth summer camps and one-on-one instruction for all ages and skill levels. Assistant Superintendent Abe Ortega reflected on the rewarding experience of helping to serve the North Texas community: “It’s been rewarding to watch the community enjoying the new facility. It was a great opportunity to positively impact the community of McKinney for years to come.”
The new two-level structure consists of six tennis courts adjoining a commons area containing a lobby, lounge areas, a viewing mezzanine, exercise rooms, restrooms, shower facilities and administrative offices. The addition of these amenities has transformed the tennis center into a multi-use, competition-level facility. Previously at the mercy of mother nature’s whims, guests can now practice, compete, exercise, observe and relax all in the comfort of an enclosed, upscale athletic complex.
While the commons area is contained in a traditionally constructed building, the courts themselves are housed within an attached pre-engineered steel frame covered in thermoplastic polyolefin (TPO) fabric with a brick masonry façade. The interior climate of the facility is controlled by a heavy-duty heating and cooling system that includes 14 variable refrigerant flow (VRF) fan coil units and eight exhaust fans, ensuring that guests can practice comfortably at any time of the year. This combination of materials and design presented an opportunity for the SpawGlass team to build a structure that is unlike any other athletic complex. “It was exciting to lead the construction effort to build a first-of-its-kind indoor tennis facility,” said Project Manager Daniel Ballin. “It’s a unique design that came together beautifully.”
In a true demonstration of living teamwork, the team rose to meet challenges along the way with creative thinking and ingenuity. In one such event, the project was closing in on completion when a winter storm damaged the building’s exterior canopies. This unexpected weather event caused the team to re-think the structure of the canopies while repairing them, adding ice shields to prevent a similar situation from happening in the future. Thinking like an owner enabled the team to solve problems with creative solutions and provide the City of McKinney with the absolute best construction experience.